


Snowfall

by furyroad



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Christmas Fluff, Cuddling & Snuggling, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Long-Distance Relationship, Post-Canon, Snow, Snowball Fight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:40:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28324701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/furyroad/pseuds/furyroad
Summary: Eleven and Max enjoy a Winter day together.**Can be read as a sequel to my fic "Daylight" or as a standalone fic.**
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper/Maxine "Max" Mayfield
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	Snowfall

The snow fell slowly outside, coating the ground in a layer of bright whiteness, the dark ground underneath disappearing from sight. Max giggled as she watched Eleven attempt to catch the snowflakes in her mouth, her tongue sticking out between her wide smile. Max could feel the chill running through her coat down to her bones, but only warmness remained in her heart at the sight of her girlfriend twirling pirouettes in the ever-growing pile of snow. Eleven nearly tripped over herself in her attempt to twirl and stare at the sky simultaneously, but Max was there to place a steading grip on her elbow. A giggle escaped her throat as Eleven pushed her away and began spinning again not a second later. 

This scene is a lot different than the last time they saw each other. The only memories that they had been able to hang on the past few months were reminiscences of hot, sunny days with ice cream and picnics in the park. It was strange seeing themselves in such a different environment. Their love had always felt so sunny and bright, like their days spent together; the opposite of the current cold surrounding them. 

In the months after Summer, Max had missed Eleven more than anything. It had been painfully hard to kiss her goodbye at the end of Summer break, and even harder to hear that they couldn’t visit each other for Thanksgiving. The moment Eleven had set foot back in Hawkins, arms were around her, lips were on her cheek, and red hair was flooding her vision. Max practically refused to let Eleven out of her touch and sight.

Max was doing the same now, attempting to grab onto Eleven as she continued to spin in the snow. Max thought she looked like an angel, snow falling around her in whirls as she glowed in the daylight. Eleven’s silly, puffy coat and too-small mittens weren’t a ridiculous scene when her bright smile shone directly to Max’s heart. 

Ever since the beginning of Winter break, Eleven and Max had been inseparable. They kissed and cuddled and laughed and never stopped, no matter the situation. They knew they loved each other, had loved each other forever, and they cherished that in any way they could. It was hard with lingering parents and friends at every turn, but they found small pockets of time for each other in any environment. When the snowstorm had practically trapped Eleven alone with her girlfriend at the Mayfield-Hargrove house, they could only be thankful for the extra time together. 

Max grabbed Eleven’s mitten-clad hand in the cold, dropping into the snow and pulling her down into the freezing ground. Eleven gasped before laughing at Max’s sudden movement, steadying her with a questioning look. 

“Snow angels,” Max stated, as if it was the most obvious reason to knock someone to the ground. Max fell onto her back, looking at the girl beside her until Eleven scooted over and copied her motion so that their hands were nearly touching. They laid in relative silence as they made their snow angels before Eleven stood up to admire her work.

“Mine doesn’t even look like an angel,” Eleven frowned before moving her eyes to where Max still laid on the ground. “Oh! I found the angel.”

Max giggled as a slight blush crossed her cheeks, adding to the redness already coating her pale skin from the cold. “That was so fucking cheesy, El.”

“You’re just jealous you didn’t make the joke first,” Eleven smirked, pressing her foot right up against Max’s leg so that she’d ruin her snow angel. 

Max rolled her eyes, giving Eleven an exasperated look. “C’mere.”

“What?” Eleven questioned, and Max could hear the smile in her voice. “I’m going to ruin your snow angel.”

“You already did,” Max stated simply, forcing her arms out of the deep snow to make grabby hands at the girl above her. Eleven shook her head fondly before taking the other’s hands and dropping down to her knees next to Max.

“Now my legs are cold,” Eleven whined as she laid directly on top of Max, resting her head on Max’s chest. Max just chuckled in response, letting go of one of Eleven’s hands to bring her arm up to wrap around the brunette’s shoulders. Eleven hummed at the contact, snuggling her face into Max’s chest in the snow. 

“Why did you tell me to make a snow angel if you were just gonna make me lay down with you anyways?” Eleven questioned, beginning to draw patterns in the snow with her fingers. 

“How else was I going to get you in the snow?” Max giggled, rubbing her hand up and down Eleven’s arm in hopes to warm her up even more.

“You already had me in the snow, idiot,” Eleven comments.

Max laughs at the reply, remembering every late night on the phone that ended with a “Goodnight, idiot” on the other end. There was something so different about hearing the silly nickname in person. Max had so desperately missed everything about Eleven that couldn’t be expressed through phone calls and letters: the light smirk she so frequently adorned, her habit of tucking her hair behind her ear, her light giggle that you couldn’t hear unless you were super close. It felt so much more real with her by her side: them both feeling the same chilliness of the weather and warmth of love.

They laid in their blanket of snow for a mere three minutes before Max was groaning. “This was a horrible idea,” she laughed, “I'm cold as shit.”

“I don’t want to move now,” Eleven sighed, a yawn escaping her lips. “You’re warm.”

“It’ll be warmer inside, baby,” Max reasoned, but Eleven still didn’t move from on top of her.

“You left me no choice,” Max grinned before releasing Eleven's shoulder and grabbing a handful of snow before replacing her hand back on Eleven’s head.

Eleven shot up the second the snow hit her hair, and her wide eyes focused on Max before she was suddenly shooting away and hurling a messy snowball Max’s way.

The snowball merely missed Max’s face, hitting the left side of her chest before her mouth was gaping open and a laugh bubbled out of her throat as she watched the smug look grow on Eleven’s face.

The two both quickly tried to sneakily make snowballs off to the side. They maintained eye contact as they threw their second snowballs simultaneously, Eleven almost getting snow in her mouth when she couldn’t keep the grin off her face.

The third time around, Eleven nearly hit Max square in the face, and the shock on Max’s face was enough to send her falling into the snow again with the force of her laughter. Max laughed along with her, the sound warming up Eleven just a little bit.

Eventually, Max was able to drag Eleven inside the house through the garage, pausing after opening the door so the two of them could help pull off each other’s gloves, coats, and shoes, and almost landing themselves in a laughing heap on the floor when Max’s boot refused to come off the first time around. Max could feel warmth cover her freezing fingers, and a smile graced her face when Eleven’s hands were engulfing her own the second they both had their gloves off. 

They slid in their socks across the hardwood floors, zigzagging through the hallway towards the kitchen. They felt undeniably childish, but that’s just what they brought out in each other. No matter their mood, they were incredibly giddy around each other. It was as if the other’s presence naturally brought out a high in the both of them with constant smiles and loopy love. 

The normal distance between them was hard. Being states away wasn’t ideal for their relationship, but both knew that they would never give up what they have. So, even though Max couldn’t always answer the phone, and Eleven was bad at sending letters back when she got them, the sentiment was always there. The love was still felt from hundreds of miles away. Eleven would always try to visit Max in the void despite the loss of her powers, and even though she never succeeded, Max could still feel the warmth of her there somehow.

Sometimes the distance was so hard that Max had to fight off the urge to skateboard the whole way to Eleven’s new house with the Byers. Sometimes Eleven prayed to a God she didn’t even know much about, just to ask for her powers back to see her love in the void, or to ask for a way to see Max anytime soon. They planned out all the meetups that they possibly could, with every holiday and school break immediately making their way onto a calendar. Eleven refrained from asking practically every week if the family could visit Hawkins for the weekend, and Max refrained from asking Eleven if she could ask.

They planned out more than just their meetups. They planned their phone calls, planned their letters, and, moreso, planned the future. They wanted to find a way for Eleven to attend college so they could dorm together. They wanted to go to college in California, where Max could see the beach and visit her father. They wanted to transfer to an apartment filled with plants and a small cat curled in the corner. They had even planned out the details of their future cat with wishes to take in a stray or a cat stuck in a shelter, and Max had already begun to think of ways to stop Eleven from taking practically every animal home with her, no matter how much the two of them both wanted all the pets they could garner. 

Max fondly thought of their future cat, most likely cats, as she pulled two kitten-doodle-covered mugs out of the cupboard while Eleven found herself digging through a cabinet on the opposite side of the kitchen before she produced two packets of cocoa powder. They worked in tandem to make the hot chocolate, spending way too long throwing marshmallows into each other’s mouths that by the time they were drinking their beverages, the hot chocolate had already begun to cool down. 

They stayed in the kitchen, leaning against the counter and looking at the other with all the content in the world as the conversation of friends and school dwindled and all that hung in the air was tenderness and endearment. 

“Guess what?” Eleven asked, the enticing smirk back on her face. 

When Max only lifted an eyebrow in response, Eleven rolled her eyes before bringing her hot chocolate in front of her face. “I love you,” Eleven smiled from behind her mug, her careful eyes looking at Max adoringly through her eyelashes. 

“I love you more,” Max immediately responded with a grin, stubborn as always. 

No matter how many times the two said those words, they never lost their meaning. Hundreds of miles or an inch apart, the words were said with the same reverence and feeling as the first time. They felt the same love they did the week before Eleven left Hawkins the last time, when Max had first dared to utter those words aloud, and Eleven repeated them back. The words still brought the pleasant, bright feeling of content to their cores. They love each other, and there’s nothing better than that. 

They found themselves in the living room after having disposed of their mugs in the sink, too lazy to do anything but sit around all day. They sat in front of the Christmas tree in the corner of the room, still up a week after Christmas. Despite the protest from her mother and step-father, Max had taken down all of the ornaments just so that she could redecorate the tree with Eleven. Even though the tree didn’t look nearly as pretty as it did when Mrs. Hargrove decorated it, it looked better somehow. They smiled at the mismatched ornaments, Eleven stealing a glance at the yellow bulb that Max had scribbled cat ears and a heart onto the bottom of. 

Eleven tore her eyes away from their masterpiece to slide over to Max, planting a quick kiss on her lips before wrapping her arms around her. Eleven cherished the moments like these: when she could touch her girlfriend rather than just hear her voice. There was something indescribable about having the one she loves most right here with her. She would itch with the need to clutch onto Max both when they were together and when they weren’t, so the past few weeks had been stock full of intertwined hands and arms over shoulders and deep hugs.

“My sunshine,” Eleven smiled after a few minutes of silence, tightening her arms as much as she could.

“Your sunshine,” Max relayed, rubbing circles into Eleven’s back, fulfilled to stay here for the rest of her life.

The sun shone through the window, casting them in bright, warm light. Eleven cherished the warmth against her skin along with the warmth from Max’s arms. She felt so content there, as if there were no troubles in the world as long as she was warm. 

“I felt so cold without you,” Eleven had told Max a few days after her arrival, “You’re like my sunshine, you know. Everything’s a little dull when you’re not around.” 

Max had tightened her arms around Eleven, pulling her impossibly closer in their hug. “I felt the same way, baby. Like─ like you’re my soulmate. I feel so warm with you here and it’s like a part of me is missing when you’re gone.”

“Sunshine,” Eleven whispered after a long pause, a soft smile gracing her face where it was pressed against Max’s chest. “We’re each other’s sunshine.”

“Sunshine,” Max copied with the most blissful grin on her face, resting her head on top of Eleven’s. “My warmth in the cold.” 

No matter how cold, they will always have one another, and there’s nothing warmer than that.


End file.
